Trying To Be Human
by KalliopeStarmist
Summary: By Popular Demand: the sequel to 'If You Give A Sin A Soul! Poor little Reg thought his problems were over. But, then, he thought his folks were dead, too. Can the littlest Sin get married before Roy gets too nosy?
1. Greg Frankenstein

Trying To Be Human

Chapter 1: Greg Frankenstein

A/N: Well, here it is, back by popular demand, the sequel. You should know that I had 'If You Give A Sin A Soul' completely written before I posted it, which is why I managed to finish it so quickly. This one is just thrown together, and if you have any ideas for it whatsoever, please, feel free to tell me them, and I will try to include them.

To my reviewers:

Shiruba Neko: Thanks. I like the Ebay thing too. And thanks for the nice adjectives. I'll start a collection of them...

Totschafe: Wow. So much Faveness. I feel loved... oh, and your description of your hair made my day that much brighter. Mine does that too, but only when it gets wet.

La Salle De Bain: Thanks. I told one of my friends about this idea when we were standing on the street... just because... and she doubled over laughing... and that's how it became a story... (I'm so sure you needed to know that.)

BHS: Hmm... answering all this could take a long time... Oh well, I'll just cover the basics. I'll be the first to admit I have no idea what to do for this sequel, so** Please, please, please**, write the spin off.

EVERYBODY! ANNOUNCEMENT! Check out BHS's profile, because she may be coming out with more Reg, Elly, and the Sins sometime. And she has a bunch of other stories, too.

Yeah. I didn't like killing Envy. Or any of the others. But, I had the ending written before a lot of the rest... so I had to go through with it. It made me sad... so I'm very happy there was so much demand for a continuation.

Spotteddog12: Here's your sequel!

Contemplative: I'm glad you stumbled on to it, too. Reviews bring happiness, what can I say?

---

Name: Gluttony

Human Name: Boris

Official Power: Eats Anything and Everything

Actual Power: Doesn't Stress Like All The Others

Description: He's like an adorable, canabalistic teddy bear. And he has a child-of-the-corn kind of voice. What's not to love?

Favorite Movie: Babbette's Feast. Or any of those foreign films with all the food.

First Thing He'd Do With A Soul: Mmm... Soul food...

Quote: The secret to success is to eat what you want and let the food fight it out inside.

—

Gluttony was having a bad time of it.

It was pure chance he was still alive in the first place. Elysia had missed him, and he had had the presence of mind to play dead. The carnage around him suggested the others hadn't fared so well.

Instinct lead him straight to his old partner in crime, Lust, to see if she had survived. Nope. Part of her head was missing. That's a bit of a giveaway.

A quick inspection of the others showed them all to be legally dead as well.

It was no use. Gluttony walked to the kitchen, grabbed his set of house keys, and unlocked the cellar door. Down there he moved aside an old broken washing machine that had come with the house and began to dig.

Not until he returned, Philosopher's Stone in hand, to the remains of his 'family', did he start to panic. Because, if the truth were told, Gluttony had been entrusted with the precious item because he had no idea how to use it.

Actually, none of them really knew how it worked. Wrath (damn kids with their new fangled technology) had been the one who figured out how to use it. Gluttony wished very much that Wrath had stuck around. He was a smart kid. He would know what to do.

They were already dead, Gluttony tried to reason, the worst that could happen was they would stay that way. He moved over to Lust's body. Then stopped. Because there's only so much you can lie to yourself.

There are worst things than death. The Sins had been exposed to many of them over the years. Gluttony wasn't sure how much damage a Philosopher's Stone could inflict, and he didn't want Lust to be the one to find out.

So, Gluttony moved over to Envy. Ah, Envy. He and Envy had had some good times.

So, Gluttony moved over to Sloth. Good old Sloth. Life wouldn't be the same without Sloth.

So, Gluttony moved over to Greed. He didn't want to bring Greed back at all.

Nobody could get either Greed or Gluttony to talk about the incident which had turned them into such bitter enemies. Apparently, and this is only guesswork, long before the rest were around, Greed and Glut had made some kind of bet, only Gluttony failed to make good on his end of the bargain. As a result, Greed was imprisoned for a century or so, and Gluttony had lived in terror of his revenge.

It was an uneasy truce which kept the two living in the same house all these years, not helped by Greed's controversial interest in alchemy.

Gluttony smacked his forehead. Of course! Greed could figure out how to work the stone. As for the possibility of bringing him back as something unnatural, well, as long as he came back with half a brain, Gluttony didn't much care what he came back as.

So... alchemy... Gluttony knew almost as much about alchemy as he knew about open heart surgery. Weren't you supposed to have a circle? It had been a long time since he had seen a transmutation circle. What did they look like? What did you draw them with? Blood? There was plenty of that around... but it was kinda sticky and hard to draw with. Maybe there was something in the kitchen.

Five minutes later, Gluttony carefully placed the stone in the center of a lopsided chocolate syrup circle drawn on Greed's stomach. Trying to remember the next step, Gluttony clapped his hands together and brought them down in the sticky substance.

"Arise, Chicken. Arise!" he chanted, clapping his hands down on Greed in rhythm. "Arise, Chicken! Arise!"

"OOF!"

"Arise, Chicken!"

"Who you callin' chicken, fatty-boy?"

"Arise!"

Greed sat up and grabbed Glut by the shirt. "Stop trying to break my ribs! I'm awake already!"

Gluttony gulped. He had never been glad to see Greed before. And sure enough, he wasn't glad to see him now.

Greed dropped him and rubbed his kidneys. "You moron! Couldn't you have removed the bullets first?"

"I... I didn't know..."

"Oh, shut up," the pointy toothed reincarnate snapped irritably.

"Uh... Greed? I was hoping... maybe you could help with the others?"

"Well, duh, tubby. D'ya really think I want to spend the rest of my life with a dithering idiot like you? And, God, what's with the chocolate syrup. Kinda kinky, don't you think?"

"I was trying to help..."

"By covering me with ice cream topping? Have you lost your tiny homunculus mind?" Gluttony cowered in a corner, and Greed, muttering under his breath, walked over to Lust and ripped her metal finger off.

"What are you doing?"

Greed rolled his eyes and ignored him. Instead, he bent over Lust's corpse and began to delicately pry the shrapnel from her skull using the finger. He worked quickly and efficiently, without glancing up until he was sure her body was metal-free. Then he stood up and glared at Gluttony.

"Don't just stand there with your mouth open! Carry her up to my room, and roll up the carpet there. Move the furniture, whatever, and get back down here! And don't put her on my bed, either. I don't want blood on the mattress.

Under a desk, a bookshelf, and an ornate Persian rug, Gluttony found what Greed had been looking for: a complete, perfect transmutation circle was etched out on the floor. Now they knew what he spent all his time up here doing.

—

"Wow, Sloth..." Greed whistled under his breath. "She got you good, didn't she?" The automail finger carefully curled around a piece of bullet. "Well, don't worry. You'll cough that blood out of your lungs in no time."

"Uh... Greed?"

Greed jumped and lost his grip on the bullet. "**What is it, Weight-watcher?**"

"Anything else I should do?"

"Yes, actually. Take Envy upstairs. He got lucky. Only one shot."

It was a little eerie in the Tower, sitting next to the lifeless bodies of Lust and Envy, the transmute circle, sensing it was needed, glowing faintly.

All in all, seeing Greed was a relief, especially when he seemed so confident. Gluttony tried to edge away for a quick bite to eat. All this tension made him hungry.

"Stay where you are, Super-size! I may still need you." Barked Greed without looking up from his book.

Outside, thunder crashed. Lighting streaked across the sky, and the window at the top of the tower of the dark Victorian house glowed an supernatural blue. Maniacal laughter rent the stormy night. "GIVE MY CREATION LIFE! IGOR! The stone!"

"Yes, Master!"

—

Things weren't processing well for Lust. Her eyes were open. Her head hurt. Gluttony was holding her up. She was in Greed's room. She couldn't remember getting there. "Oh, God. How much did I drink last night? Who did I sleep with?"

Greed was in her line of sight, helping Envy sit up. He smiled at her. Lust wasn't amused.

"Envy too? Woo. That was one wild party... hope Wrath didn't hear anything. He may be scarred for life..." Wait... Wrath... Wrath was grown up now. Last night came back to her in flashes. Wrath. Elly. Deadwood. Elysia Hughes. Martini. Elly. Machine gun. Death. Lust's mouth dropped open.

"I... I was dead."

"But you're alive now," Gluttony assured her. Lust turned so she could see him better. "You... brought me back?"

"Of course," smiled Gluttony. "Me and Greed."

This was too much. Lust sat upright and slapped him. "What the hell did you do that for? How long have you known me? How long have we been friends? You know I don't want to live!"

"But... but... I was lonely."

"Oh, Glut." Lust sighed, hugging him. "It's ok. I—" Lust caught sight of her left hand and whirled around. "Where'd my finger go?" She caught sight of Greed, lunged at him, and snatched back her finger. "Give me that!"

The finger snapped back into place, Lust whimpering a little as the nerves reconnected, which in turn woke Envy.

"Take that, pipsqu...oh..." It was an odd scene to wake up to; Lust wincing as she flexed her finger, Glut watching her, still unsure if he had done the right thing, Sloth not really breathing, and Greed covered with chocolate sauce and blood. There wasn't much Envy could say about that. "What up?"

"Well, you're alive, for starters."

"Oh... I do hope I got my old soul back. I've grown rather fond of it... Say, what's wrong with Sloth? You brought her back too, didn't you?"

"Um... about that..." All eyes turned to Greed. "She might...er, need a little more work."

There was an expectant pause. Envy cocked his head to one side. "Well? Back to work, then?"

"I'm not sure I can do it," Greed admitted.

"WHAT?"

"Well, I did everything I know how to do... either she'll wake up, or we've lost her." The others glowered at him. "Look, I don't have a whole lot of books on human transmutation, ok?"

"Why the hell not?"

"Because they're illegal. And that happens to be a law I agree strongly with."

"Greed! When we give you large amounts of cash, we expect you to buy highly illegal literature with it!"

"I spent it on a new computer with high-speed Internet."

"Sloth is DEAD because you wanted a computer! Shame on you!"

Envy smiled sadistically. "Well, there is one solution. We bury her, then go out and find a psychotic teacher, learn more about alchemy, ditch an arm, leg and body trying to bring her back, fail miserably, and burn down the house."

"And then we embark on a life of do-goodness, joining the military to make ends meet?" Lust laughed.

"Exactly. And angsting constantly and being stalked by crazy Ishbalans and a small group of Homunculi."

Greed blinked, completely lost. "You've really thought this out, haven't you?"

Envy and Lust smiled at him, then looked at one another. They were about to laughed, but then they remembered Sloth.

"Poor Sloth," Lust sighed.

"Poor Sloth," Echoed Gluttony.

"Philosopher's Stone my ass." Envy muttered.

Greed stood up solemnly. "Well, she's not getting any warmer. I suppose we'd better go bury her." The others began to file from the room.

"Oh, are we really playing that?" Sloth asked eagerly, trying weakly to sit up. "Can I be the one who turns into a walking talking trash can?"

"SLOTH! You're alive!" cheered the rest, tackling her joyfully.

"Of course I'm alive. I've died before, it hasn't stopped me yet. Now, can I be metal man or not?"

—

On a train speeding away from this happy reunion, Elly (formerly Elysia Hughes) and Reg (formerly Wrath) were getting some well deserved rest.

"Reg?" Elly mumbled sleepily, resting her head on his shoulder.

"Hmm?"

"I want lots of kids."

"Me too," Reg murmured, nodding off. "Five hundred of them."

"Yeah," Elly smiled dopely. "Babies everywhere."

"Elly?"

"Yes, Reg?"

"I love you very much."

"I do too. I mean, I love you too."


	2. Going To The Doctor

Trying to Be Human

Chapter 2: Never Go To A Doctor Whose Office Plants Have Died

A/N: Sorry this took so long. I'm a very lazy person.

OOH! We got cable! Which means that every other weekend (when I'm at my dad's), I can watch ADULT SWIM! Which also means that I don't have to watch random pre-recorded/FanSubbed episodes at friends' houses to get my FMA fix! (I'm psyched). Following this line, very special thanks to Amateur Conspiracy Theorists Chesca (sp?) and Winry, for all their inspirational insanity/phone tapping. Give them a hand, everybody.

**Review Answers:**

Asakihe: OH! I forgot to answer your review last chapter! I'm so sorry! .:dies:. I know you weren't flaming me... I really do... AH! And now it seems like I'm mad because I didn't answer your review in the first chap... I don't know how I skipped it... SORRY!

Dragonwing08: Nice pen name, I like it. You're welcome for the sequel. And the chocolate syrup.

Contemplative: Thanks... I was worried, because sequels usually do suck, so I'm happy for the feedback... And I'm glad someone liked the "Arise, Chicken" chant.

WelcomeToKatzMotel: Flawless, Cruel, and Funny? Can't ask for better praise than that.

Adrienne: Congrats on being the first reviewer! Sorry the update wasn't as quick as you would have liked, but very very happy that one more person in this world likes Gluttony. I feel I've done my duty.

Oh! Hey... there's a Reply button under these reviews... maybe I should use that next time... Wow... I need to spend more time on fanfiction, so I can tell what's going on. Oops.

**Interesting Factoid/Trivia Tidbit:** In Japan, when something is very Western influenced, they say it 'smells like milk', because we consume more dairy products than they do (i.e. milk, cheese, yogurt, exc.) (And if you think about how milk smells, you realize this isn't a complement). For example, FMA smells like milk. Ed smells like milk. That's why Ed hates milk. It's a joke.

---

Name: Greed

Human Name: Greg

Official Power: He has one... really, he does!

Actual Power: Pointy Teeth, Good People Skills

Description: Pointy teeth/hair, black leather vest with white fur trim, and Elton John sunglasses... Also, he seriously looks like Hughes. (Please, back me up on this one.)

Favorite Movie: Annie, Get Your Gun

First Thing He'd Do With A Soul: Start worrying about his age. ("Ah! A gray hair!")

Quote: A thing worth having is a thing worth cheating for.

---

Sunrise found the Sins still sitting around Greed's room.

"So," Envy observed, "we're alive."

Lust continued to stare at the wall. "Yup. Pretty much."

"What now?"

"What do you mean, _what now_?" gasped the ever-optimistic Sloth, shocked that anyone could ask such a thing. "We're ALIVE!"

"... so?"

"So, enjoy it! Life is a precious gift! It's beautiful! _Cherish the moments!_"

"No, Sloth. Stop. Stop it now."

"You all are so _cynical_! Be happy! We finally have everything we want in life! We're _alive_! We have souls! We have a nice house, cash to spare, and digital cable! Wrath's getting married! One of us turned out _normal_! We should be celebrating!"

There was another very long stretch silence.

"So..." Envy tried again. "What now?"

"Order a pizza?" Gluttony suggested.

"Domino's is having that 555 deal," added Greed. "We could get anchovies."

"Or we could not."

—

As for Reg and Elly, at sunrise they were staggering into Elly's house.

"Do you mind sleeping on the couch, Reg?" Elly whispered, trying not to wake her mother, who was sleeping, as are all sane people at dawn.

Reg sat down on the couch, intending to ask "Won't your mom be a little scared if she comes downstairs in the morning and finds a stranger on her sofa?", but the instant he sat down, his body mutinied and he fell over, asleep.

—

"I don't wanna go downstairs and think about the blood we have to clean up," Lust groaned, slamming the back of her head against the wall and closing her eyes.

"Maybe we _should_ burn down the house," Envy muttered. Greed perked up.

"I've got the kerosine!"

"I was joking, Greed."

"Oh."

"I'm hungry," Gluttony announced.

"I've got a hangover," Lust added.

Sloth coughed up a bit of blood still stuck in her lungs from the bullets.

"Um...I'm still wearing Greed's clothes?" Envy volunteered, not wanting to be left out.

"Ha. I've got you all beat." Greed laughed. "Envy's wearing my clothes, there are a bunch of people invading my room, and I've still got bullets embedded in my organs."

The rest winced. "Uh, Greed? That's not good..." With great effort, Sloth stood up. "We should probably get you some medical attention before you get lead poisoning... Come on, let's go to the hospital. Oh, and we should call a maid service and see what they can do about the living room."

—

Click.

The little sound was barely audible, but it woke Reg up instantly. After years of living with his family, he didn't need to open his eyes to know a rifle had just been loaded and was pointing straight at him.

"Don't move, or I blow your brains out," growled a voice somewhere above him.

"Mum! What are you doing?"

"Elly? You're home?"

"Reg, whom you're currently holding at gunpoint, and I got in last night. I didn't want to wake you up, so we let ourselves in."

Nervously, Reg opened one eye. "Um... can I move yet?"

Gracia Hughes quickly returned the rifle to its resting spot above the mantel. "Sorry, Reggie. I didn't realize it was you... you can understand my reaction."

"Yes. Of course. Sorry to surprise you like that, ma'am."

"No need to be sorry. Simple misunderstanding..." Gracia laughed and turned back to her daughter. "I wasn't expecting you until tomorrow. Didn't you visit Reg's family?"

"Oh," Elly smiled innocently. "They were a little busy this weekend, so we decided to stop on the way back and see them...That's alright, isn't it, mummy?"

"Of course, dear."

Behind her mother's back, Elly grinned and winked at Reg, who grinned back. Operation Cover Up had gone off without a hitch, and life went on.

—

"I don't understand how these bullet holes managed to heal themselves... and without any scars, too," Dr. Soice, the Sins' family doctor, and only doctor in the little village they lived in, muttered, poking at Greed's back with a tongue depressor. "It doesn't seem natural..."

"Yeah, yeah," growled the patient irritably. "How do I get rid of these bullets? Can you, like, pick them out or something?"

"Well, surgery could probably remove them..." the doctor admitted, squinting blindly through his coke-bottle glasses. Lust bit her lip and glanced at Envy. Both of them were wondering about the odds of surviving surgery at the rheumatic hands of Dr. Soice.

"But we don't have the technology here for anything like that. You'll have to go to Central, they'll be able to do something... I think."

—

"I hate that quack so much," Greed grumbled from the front seat of the car. "I was going to kill him as soon as Wrath got out of school, so the kid could get a job close to home, and I was really, really looking forward to it."

"No denying we could use a decent doctor in this town," agreed the driver, Lust. "You have to wonder how many people have died while this guy's been practicing."

Gluttony mumbled something along the lines of "Remember when Wrath sprained his ankle, and he tried to convince us it was only bruised?"

"Yeah. It puffed up to the size of a coconut, and we couldn't get a doctor's excuse to take the poor kid out of school." Lust shuddered. "That was awful."

Suddenly, a fight broke out in the back seat. "Lust! Sloth's on my side of the seat!" whined Envy.

"I can't help it! Glut's crowding me!"

"Liar! You have plenty of room."

"Lust, Envy called me a liar!"

"Why does Greed get to sit up front?"

"Greed gets to sit up front because he's sick." Lust explained. "Now shut up. I'm trying to drive."

"I think I should drive. I know where I'm going better than you do," pouted Sloth.

"No way! Sloth drives like a granny," Envy griped.

"Oh, yeah? Well, you drive like a five-year-old on crack, Envy, so you aren't one to be talking."

"Neither of you is driving!" Lust snapped. "Now BE QUIET!"

This achieved three seconds of absolute quiet.

"LUST! Envy pinched me!"

"I did not! Sloth stuck her tongue out at me!"

"Oh, who's the liar now, palm-tree boy?"

"I don't think Sloth should be allowed to call me names!"

"Ow! LUST! Envy keeps pinching me! Make him stop!"

The car screeched to a halt, forcing a semi-truck to swerve around it. Seething, Lust turned to the backseat passengers. "You kids stop fighting, or so help me, we are turning right back around, and Greed is just going to die!"

Envy crossed his arms and glared sullenly at Lust as she started the car up again. "I didn't want to go to Central, anyway," he muttered under his breath.

Lust spun back around, her metal fingernail at the ready. "Care to repeat that little comment, Connie?"

"No."

"That's what I thought."

And the drive continued in silence for another five minutes.

"I'm hungry," Gluttony whimpered.

"I have to go to the bathroom," whined Sloth.

"I'm getting squished," Envy complained.

"Are we there yet?" asked Greed.

Lust groaned. "Don't you start, too," she pleaded.

—

Since they had nothing else to do, Reg and Elly decided to walk around town that afternoon and unwind. "Mom's inviting a couple of old friends over for dinner tomorrow night," Elly notified her fiancee. "I was thinking of telling them about our engagement then. Saves me the trouble of calling all of them up."

"Yeah. That sounds good... So, I should be on my best behavior, then?"

"Aren't you always?" Elly smiled sweetly at him, then had an ADD moment and pulled him towards a bakery. "Do you want to get a cinnamon roll?"

Reg grinned. "Sure... Gl-Boris makes the best cinnamon rolls ever, you'll have to remind me to have him make some next time..." Reality hit Reg like a sack of potatoes. "Never mind."

"Reg," Elly bowed her head guiltily. "I have a confession to make...I ..." she choked a little, and Reg put a hand on her shoulder reassuringly. "I miss your folks."

"I think I do, too," Reg whispered.

"Isn't that horrible, though? We shouldn't miss them... We should be glad they're gone."

"I know... we should feel good that the world is short five people." Reg laughed a little to show he was joking. "It's natural to feel a little weird about killing someone, or losing someone. We'll get over it, eventually."_ I hope..._

—

It was dark out by the time the Sins' car pulled into the Central Memorial Hospital, mostly because they got lost several times, and Sloth, who knew where they were going, was refusing to speak to anybody by that time, so they had to piece together a mental map from their faulty memories.

"So, Greg, you have bullets in your guts." Dr. Hibbert, a jovial middle-aged man, informed him, eyeing the x-rays. "We'll want to get those out as soon as possible."

"But you can do it, can't you?"

"Oh, yes." the doctor chuckled the satisfied chuckle of a man who has lots of money coming to him in the near future. "We'll start with a fund-depleting incision at the base of the corpus brontellus, then use financial straights to remove the shrapnel from the antipodus xanthippelum, the mallomus barmus, and the spleen. Next, we'll come up through the expensivus procedurum, and get that little guy up there in the cogito ergo, and finish up with a nice, exorbitantus dimsum procedure. Will you be paying cash or credit?"

"I didn't catch a word of that, but it sounded painful," Greed whispered to Envy.

—

Back at Elly's place, later that night, Reg sighed and stretched out on the couch in the living room. Life was looking good. He and Elly were getting married, he'd finish med school and get a job with a ridiculously high salary, and they'd live happily ever after. Maybe they could move into his old house. Or not. It wouldn't really be the same without the others. Oh well.

Reg was just starting to slip out of consciousness when someone threw a stick at the window.

Clutching simultaneously at his palpitating heart and the edge of the couch, Reg sat bolt upright.

The tap came at the window again, and an all-too familiar voice asked, "Is this even the right house?" Reg pinched himself. It couldn't be.

"Of course this is the right house." a self-satisfied woman confirmed. "Real estate market's too tight around here for a widow to afford a new one." It simply couldn't...

"I was thinking something more along the lines of you forgot the address." Impossible...

"Impossible! How dare you question my perfect memory?"

"This is the right house," verified a third voice. "I can hear him breathing." The tapping at the window grew louder and faster. Reg clutched his pillow defensively in front of him and huddled into the couch.

"Wrath! Open the—,"

"Shh! Don't call him Wrath, he's at his girlfriend's house. Reg, puppy, it's us. Open the window."

Pale as death, certain the ghosts of his family had come for him, Reg crept to the window.

The streetlight cast an weird light over the four figures crowded in front of the house, making everything seem all the more surreal. Gluttony waved a little.

Now thoroughly terrified, Reg through open the window. "Do what you want with me, just don't hurt Elly," he pleaded heroically with the vengeful specters.

"Oh, relax," Envy snapped. "We aren't going to hurt you."

"What do you want with me?" Reg, his voice breaking, whispered harshly.

"Just wanted to talk to our favorite little boy," Lust said warmly, reaching towards him to pinch his cheek affectionately. Reg jumped away from the window.

"Puppy? What's wrong?"

"Stay away from me!" hissed the young man. Lust stared at him quizzically.

Behind her, Gluttony whispered something to the other two, causing them to double over with silent laughter.

"He... haha... he thinks we're dead, Lust," Envy explained when he could talk again. "Sorry, Reg, should have told you... We're back."

Reg's mouth dropped open.

"Um... surprise?"

—

Tap tap tap tap tap.

"Elly! Elly, wake up! I need to talk to you!"

Elly squinted at her alarm clock. 4:00 am. What on earth could Reg have to talk to her about at four in the morning?

Yawning, she stumbled to the door. "What is it, Reg? Oh, God. You look awful. Can't sleep on the couch?"

Reg did look a bit of a mess. He was still wearing his PJ's, but with muddy tennis shoes. His hair was covered with a hearty sprinkling of twigs, and his eyes were bloodshot from exhaustion.

"Couch?" he echoed blankly. "Oh, the couch.. The couch was fine... No, I went for a walk... with... with...You won't believe me... I don't believe me... but, it's true... it's really happening... I just got back from taking a midnight stroll... with my family."

Forgetting her fatigue at once, Elly's eyes widened. "Are you feeling alright, Reg?"

"No... I mean, yes... I mean, I'm not sick, just freaked out."

"But, Reg, your folks... they're dead."

"I know, I thought so, too. But they aren't. They've... come back to life."

"That's impossible. They're dead. I killed them."

"No more impossible than a boy without a soul," Reg murmured, mostly to himself.

"What are they doing here, Reg?" Elly gulped. "Are they... angry about...?"

"No, not really," Reg shrugged. In truth, he was more bewildered by this than by the miraculous reanimation of his relations. Not wanting revenge for something like being massacred was completely unlike them. "They don't seem to care at all. They're just in the neighborhood, and they wanted to stop by and see me." Reg pondered this for another second. "Is that weird at all?"

Elly had to think about that one. "Well, your folks have never been exactly normal, so I can't really say... Are they in town long?"

"Um... Greg's getting surgery this morning, and they were going to leave as soon as he's good to go... probably tomorrow."

"We'll have to go visit them...unless... I don't suppose they could make it to dinner tonight?" Elly asked hopefully, having recovered from her initial shock. Reg shook his head.

"Nah, They'll probably want to stay their hotel so the hospital can reach them. But we could ask them, I guess."

"You wouldn't mind, would you? I'd like Roy and Riza to meet them."

Reg paused. "Roy and Riza... Mustang?"

"Didn't I tell you? They're coming over tonight... I could have sworn I mentioned it... Reg, darling, you're all pale! Maybe you should try and get some sleep."


	3. The Sins Are Back In Town

Trying To Be Human

Chapter 3: The Sins Are Back In Town

(Insert traditional apologies for overwhelming lateness HERE)

By the way, in case you were wondering, (my very first) OhayoCon was AWESOME! High point of my life, and definitely leading to more FMA stories from me, which I know you all are going to read...right? RIGHT?

Review Replies: It's a lot easier for me to reply via the "Reply" button on my review page thingy, but, I'm not sure it works. If you review me, and get a reply, could you please let me know somehow? I don't like leaving things to chance... Thank you! (Hey, here's an idea... you could review another chapter/story and tell me in the review. .:cough-please review-cough:. ... or my AIM is KalliopeStarmist)

And... Action!

At Elly's insistence, Reg returned to his couch to, in theory, get some more sleep. However, theory is very different from reality, and Reg wasn't in the mood to sleep. He was in the mood to worry.

And he had a good deal to worry about. His family was alive, and that meant that someday he'd have to introduce them to Gracia, which he was NOT looking forward to. Tomorrow he had to make small talk with the Mustangs, which he was _definitely_ not looking forward to. Greed was having surgery, which wasn't exactly reassuring, and he still couldn't find it in him to accept that they had all forgiven Elly for her little killing spree.

With all this on his mind, he wasn't feeling all that refreshed when Elly tiptoed downstairs at nine and shook him to wake him up. "Reg, if you want breakfast, you'd better get it now. Mum's going to be taking over the kitchen soon."

"Hmmwahah?"

"She's starting dinner for tonight," Somebody in the kitchen dropped something heavy and metallic, possibly a pan, and Elly winced. "Uh-oh... You'd better go get dressed... We'll need to get out of the house soon."

Later, Reg emerged from the bathroom fully clothed and went down to the kitchen to try to find Elly, a fatal mistake.

The room in question was filled with a dense, savory-smelling steam. Through the fog, the stove burners gave off small flames, pots made bubbling noises, and the shadowy figure of Gracia floated around, stirring, chopping, and adjusting.

"Um... Mrs. Hughes? Do you want some help?" Reg asked, squinting to see if Elly was trapped somewhere in the haze.

Elly was not in the kitchen, but just walking up to it, just in time to hear her fiancee ask the fatal question. "REG! Get down!" she screamed, tackling him and knocking the young man to the floor as a skillet flew past above them.

"**OUT! GET OUT OF THE KITCHEN! NOW!"** howled the chef.

Giggling and pulling Reg out the front door and to safety, Elly explained, "Mummy gets a tad bit temperamental when she cooks for company."

"Oh," Reg managed, still recovering. "I've got to tell you, being almost shot, then attacked with a frying pan, isn't the most promising way to start off a visit to your future mother-in-law..."

"Don't worry... she'll calm down if we stay out of her way long enough."

Inside room 314 of Central Memorial, the Sins were having a little party-type thing. After all, it wasn't everyday one of them had a major operation.

"Hey, what do you say to an Ishbalan in uniform?" Greed asked. Lust twitched.

"If you weren't recovering from surgery right now, you know damn well I'd kill you."

"Yeah, I know. I figure I should use my immunity while it lasts."

"Why you little—!"

Outside room 314, one of the nurses was arguing with a disgruntled visitor.

"I'm sorry, sir, but unless you can prove you're a family member, I can't allow you in."

"I AM a family member. I'd show you some ID, but I left my wallet at my girlfriend's psycho mother's house."

"Well, there's nothing I can do."

"Yes there is! Please, just go in there and tell them Reg and Elly are outside,"

"Now, don't you get smart with me, mister,"

"I'm not getting smart! How am I getting smart?"

Their voices floated to inside room 314, where the other Sins were dying of suppressed laughter.

"Elly's such a dear," Lust sighed. "I hope she doesn't invite us for dinner."

"Yeah..." agreed Envy, "that would be... awkward."

Outside room 314, the nurse was getting fed-up.

"Do you want me to call security?"

"No, I want you to let me see my family!"

"Not until you show me some ID."

"I told you, I left my wallet..."

"Reg, dear," Elly interrupted for the first time, "This is getting repetitive."

Inside room 314, Sloth was controlling her smile and putting on her Ultimate Surly Bureaucrat Poker Face, then sticking her head into the hallway.

"Excuse me, could you try to keep it down? Patients are trying to recover in here," she snapped at the nurse.

"I apologize, ma'am, but this young man,"

"Is my son." The nurse went white as a sterilized hospital gown, and Reg and Elly pushed past her easily.

At long, long last, everybody important had gathered inside room 314. And there was much rejoicing.

"Reg?" Greed moaned with mock-feebleness, "Is that you, boy? Come closer, son. Your old father can't see too well no more."

Rolling his eyes, but grinning nonetheless, the young man knelt by his kinsman's sickbed. "Hey, Greg."

Still feigning weakness, Greed lay a shaking hand on Reg's cheek. "I always knew you would come back someday," he whispered, his voice hoarse. "Y'know, some dramatic music would really be appreciated right about now," he added grumpily, addressing the others present.

"Sorry, we left our violins at home," Lust shot back sarcastically.

"What a pity," the invalid man muttered, returning his attention to Reg. "God, you've gotten big. I'll bet you've grown six feet since I saw you last."

Reg beamed and shook his head wildy, like a little child. It was an old ritual, going back to pre-soul era, when he saw Greed maybe once or twice a year, and they both knew damn well he hadn't grown an inch.

"You sure?" Reg shook his head once again, and Greed scratched his head in perplexity. "Oh well. Maybe I've shrunk. Here, give your ol' man a hug."

And there was more rejoicing. Everybody seemed to be in a great mood. Except for one.

Elly, usually so sunny and bubbly, was standing quietly in a corner, staring more or less at her feet. Envy delicately broke away from the celebrators and tapped her on the shoulder. "Elly, is everything all right?"

Blushing ever-so-slightly pink, Elly shook her head. Then squeezed her sort-of in-law with all her might. "I'm sorry, Connie, I'm a horrible person, but, I didn't mean to. I mean, I meant to, but I didn't _mean_ to,"

As soon as he figured out she was referring to her earlier rampage, Envy laughed. "Don't mention it."

"It takes more than bullets to stop us," Lust, who had been listening in, added carelessly.

"And if you hadn't put Greg in the hospital, we wouldn't have gotten to see Reg," Gluttony threw in.

"He only comes to visit if one of us is dying," explained Sloth.

"Hey!" barked Greed, feeling jealous of all the attention focused on someone besides himself, "How about some sugar for the terminally ill guy over here?"

Elly giggled quakily, going over to hug Terminally Ill Guy.

Sloth watched Reg thoughtfully for a while, then remarked to Lust, "He's worried about something."

Slightly amazed that someone could be so in tune with someone else's emotions (she certainly couldn't see anything unusual about Reg's behavior), but knowing you could trust Sloth with these things, Lust answered, "Do you want to talk to him, or should I?"

There was another moment while Sloth studied the young man again. "I think he'd rather talk to you."

Lust nodded curtly, then advanced on the boy. "Reg, how long have you been wearing those clothes?"

Reg surveyed his outfit: the same one he had been wearing when he arrived at his family's house three days ago. "I forgot my luggage at your place, 'Tasha," he explained shyly.

Elly now stopped to notice his attire as well. Truth be told, she was just as nervous about tonight's little dinner party. "Oh, no. What are you going to wear tonight?"

Reg had been thinking this, too, but they were in luck. Lust pulled out the car keys with a smile. "We brought your suitcase along... Reg, do you want to run out to the car with me and get it?"

They reached the car, but instead of opening the trunk, Lust sat down firmly on the hood and motioned for Reg to join her. "What's on your mind, puppy?"

Reg was astonished that she noticed his mood, but he quickly forgot about it and plopped down next to her, blurting out, "Oh, God, Natasha... The Mustangs are coming to dinner tonight."

"Mustang**_s_**? As in, there's more than one?"

"There are now. Roy and Riza."

"Riza _Hawkeye_? She married _him_?" Lust gasped. "How trite!... and yet... so destined..."

"And you know I'm scared to death of Military personnel," moaned Reg.

"Nonsense," Lust assured him, "We've always taught you, they're just regular people with slightly skewed morals and the inability to get jobs anywhere else. What did you think was going to happen if you married a girl from Central?"

"I told her we should have eloped," Reg sighed. Lust ruffled his hair.

"Relax. You've never met Roy and Riza, have you?"

Reg shook his head. "Well, they're good people." Actually, Lust hadn't officially met them, either, but she had heard a lot about them. "And don't forget, you're sort of the Ultimate Military Brat, yourself, what with,"

"Sloth and Pride, I know, I know..." Reg cut her off.

Lust thought about this. "Actually, that pretty much explains why you're afraid of the Military in the first place... But don't worry, the Mustangs are completely different."

"But... I'm going to be scared out of my mind, and Roy's, like, Elly's surrogate father, so it's _really_ important to her that I make a good impression, and that's not helping at all, and what if he asks about you guys? What if he wants to _meet_ you? What if he recognizes Envy? My life will be over!"

"Reg," Lust said gently, wanting to point out that the odds of Roy recognizing Envy were significantly small, as they had never formally met.

"I can't do this, I can't do this,"

"Reg, puppy,"

"I'm gonna die, I'm gonna die,"

"WRATH! Snap out of it!"

"... sorry." Reg murmured quietly.

"Calm down. You have nothing to worry about. Just be yourself. They're going to love you. We do."

Reg took a few deep breaths. "Um... did you actually bring my suitcase, or did you just say that to get me out here alone? Because I could really use some new clothes... these are getting a little crunchy..."


	4. First Impressions

Trying To Be Human

Chapter 4: First Impressions

A/N: as always, sorry for the no-plausable-excuse delay... and, yes, the Sins will be making an appearance later... just not this chapter.  
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The Mustangs had never had children. They had dogs, and they were happy that way. (As Riza had often lamented, it wasn't really legal to train a toddler at gunpoint.) So, in lieu of their own offspring to coddle, they coddled Elly. To her, they were family, and that was why, when she announced her engagement for the first time, it was as so important that Roy and Riza be there.

Which was perfectly fine, Reg told himself, and actually very sweet, and OH SWEET CHEESE! They're HERE! I'm going to die! Lust was wrong, they're going to kill me...

Elly swept past him to get the door, but not without stopping to straighten out his (clean) shirt collar and kiss him lightly on the cheek. "They're going to love you," she told him confidently.

"Shh! You'll jinx it."

"There's nothing to jinx," Elly assured her nervous fiancé, wrapping her arms around his neck, pulling him closer, and,

DING-DONG, rang the doorbell impatiently.  
----------------------------------------

Outside, Roy leaned on the doorbell and tried to peer through the curtains as Riza lectured him on proper boyfriend-meeting etiquette.

"Gracia says that he's a nice boy, so none of that I-know-what-you-did type stuff. We aren't here to intimidate the poor kid."

"Yes we are," her husband interrupted. "That's the whole point! This boy needs to learn that we are not his friends. We are to be feared. And respected."

Riza shook her head, hiding her smile behind the cake she was carrying. (When the two families got together, the Mustangs traditionally brought dessert. Store bought, of course, Gracia having no illusions about either's ability to cook.) "Mustang..."

"What?"

"Nothing."

"No, tell me. What?"

It may be noted that Roy and Riza had a happy marriage. However, now one, including themselves, could find any substantial proof of this.

Elly threw open the door and hugged Roy joyously, calling, "Roy-san!"

Roy returned the hug, calling, "Elysia-chan!"

Gracia ran out of the kitchen, calling out greetings.

Reg fidgeted awkwardly in the background until Roy fixed him with the Military's patented cold, heartless, unfeeling look.

Elly came to her fiancé's rescue when she noticed he was about to start hyperventilating. "Roy, Riza, this is Reg."

Riza smiled. Roy did not. Riza glared at him (Roy, not Reg). Roy returned the glare with a silent "what?". Riza twitched. Roy pretended not to notice. Riza set the cake down and reached for her gun. Roy gulped and offered Reg his hand.

Reg gulped and shook it. "It's good to meet you, sir."

Roy made a noncommittal noise in the back of his throat.

Reg guessed then and there that the night was not going to go well.  
------------------------------------------

Dinner was, indeed, unpleasant. Through some catastrophic accident in seating arrangements, Reg found himself across the table from Roy, and, he swore, that man didn't blink the_ entire_ evening!

"So, _Ron_," the hostile adult asked over his food.

"It's Reg, Roy," Reg corrected good-naturedly.

"It's Mr. Mustang, Reg," Roy agreed.

Reg lowered his eyes submissively. "Yes... sorry, sir."

"Anyway, 'Reg'", just what is it that you do for a living?"

"I... um.. Well, I ... um..." Reg's mind went blank in panic, and he ended up answering with the truth, "I bus tables at a local café."

"A noble profession," Roy remarked dryly.

"Reg is studying to become a doctor, aren't you, dear?" Elly interrupted, thank goodness.

"Oh, really?" Roy raised an eyebrow in such a way to suggest he had been more impressed with the table-busing gig. Reg gulped and when back to not speaking unless spoken to, which worked fairly well... until dessert.

Elly cleared her throat to get everyone's attention. "Reg and I have an announcement to make."

Reg, his nerves destroyed from sitting under Roy's death stare all evening, panicked. "We do?" Elly just winked and squeezed his hand, which was when Reg noticed that she had slipped her engagement ring back on. "Oh. Yeah. We do."

"Mommy, Roy, Riza... Reg and I are getting married."

"You are?" Gracia gasped, leaping out of her seat to hug her daughter and future son-in-law.

"You are?" gasped Roy, stunned.

Riza's expression didn't change. She took another bite of cake.  
-----------------------------------------------

Reg offered to clean up the dishes, and Roy jumped to help him, if that's what you want to call it. He really wasn't so much helping as he was taking advantage of an opportunity to speak to the young man alone.

"So, a doctor, huh?" Roy asked, leaning menacingly against the stove.

Reg gulped as he scrubbed another plate. "Yes, sir." He remembered Envy once told him that Colonel Mustang had shot a couple of doctors early on in his career. He hoped it was a one-time type of thing.

"And do your folks know that you're planning on getting married?"

Reg nodded. "I called them and told them." This seemed a little impersonal, so he added, "They live out in the country, so it's hard to get out there to see them." Roy didn't say anything, so Reg continued, "they were very happy about the whole thing. They think Elly's great."

"Oh, have they met her?"

Too late, Reg realized his mistake. "Um.. Yes, sir."

Fortunately, Roy didn't think anything of it. "So, tell me a little bit about your family. What does your father do?"

"Well, actually, I don't really have a father... I live with a... um... a distant cousin and her friends."

"I see," Roy said quietly, reminding Reg uncomfortably of a professor of his who would walk around with a clipboard during labs, and who always said "I see" when you messed up. "We'll have to meet them sometime... And you think you're in love with Elysia?"

Finally, a question Reg knew the answer to. "I know I am. She's the only person I could ever be happy with. Just thinking about her makes me feel better, and I love the way she laughs." He continued in this vein until Roy gagged a little, and Reg took this as a sign to wrap it up. "I want to spend the rest of my life with her... um, Mr. Mustang, sir."

Feeling a little warm under the older man's disapproving stare, Reg pulled off his sweater.

"What's that on your arm, Reg?" Roy scowled.

"Th-th-this?" stuttered Reg, clamping a hand over the odd mark on his upper right arm. "Just a scar... my neighbor's poodle, Reynard, attacked me on my way home from school when I was little. I hated that dog."

"You don't like dogs?" Roy asked menacingly.

"No sir! I _love_ dogs! Really! I just... didn't care for that poodle very much! That's all!"

"_I see._"  
--------------------------------------

"I don't like him," Roy declared, as Riza drove them home. (Married how long, and he still didn't have that damn driver's license.) "He's hiding something."

"He's a college student, Mustang. What could he possibly have to hide?"

"Drugs, mafia ties, another wife,"

"He's in _college_."

"I don't trust a boy who doesn't like dogs."

Riza groaned. "For god's sake, he didn't say he doesn't like dogs, he said he had a bad run-in with a poodle!" She glanced accusingly at the man next to her. "If I recall, you don't like poodles much, either."

Roy turned to the window to hide from his wife's stare. "I'm always afraid they'll bite my ankles," he whispered. "All right, She-Who-Knows-All, what did _you_ think of him?"

At once, Riza's face became completely unreadable, especially by streetlight. "I didn't get much of a chance to talk to him."

"Well, you'll have plenty of chance tomorrow," her husband remarked bitterly. "And that's another thing! Why didn't he tell us his "family" was in town?"

"They were here for an operation, Roy! The poor kid was probably worried to death, he didn't want to talk about it."

"I don't know about this "family". One kid and a bunch of completely unrelated adults? Something's up with that. It's not what I want Elysia marrying into."

The car screeched to a halt as Riza pulled into their driveway. "Listen to me, Colonel," (Roy had long since been promoted, but Riza still called him that, particularly when she was angry), "you are going to be nice to these people. Not just polite, _nice_. We are going to make friends with them, and we are not going to judge them just because they aren't a traditional family unit. This is the family our little girl's future husband is from, and you had better be on your best damn behavior, or else. Do you understand me?"

"But, Rizy,"

"This is serious!_ Do you understand me?_"  
-------------------------------------------------

"Well, that went pretty well," Elly told Reg half-heartedly after the Mustangs left.

"It was a fiasco, wasn't it?" he asked glumly, sitting on the couch.

"Not a fiasco, per say... it could have gone a lot worse."

"I'm sorry, Elly. I really tried,"

"Oh, Reg!" the young woman exclaimed encouragingly, hugging him. "I know you did! I wasn't blaming you. Roy-san'll lighten up. He's just shocked, that's all."  
-----------------------------------------------------

It was rather late when the Sins got a phone call to their hotel room.

"Hello," Sloth greeted. "Oh, Elly! Why are you calling?... Really? Of course! We'd love to!... oh, yeah, Greg'll be out by then, but he might not be able to eat much... where? Is that place still open?... Great!... Mustangs? Not Roy Mustang? ...I can't believe it. After all these years. I'd love to see them again... oh, well, I imagine you're tired... ok, 6:30, then. Goodnight, love." Sloth hung up, smiling at her companions. "Well, we have something to do tomorrow night!"  
-------------------------------------------------------

Elly hung up, staring quizzically at the phone. "Hey, Reg?... Trisha just said she'd love to see Roy and Riza "after all these years"... what did she mean?"

Reg's whole body stiffened. "Oh no. How could I have forgotten?"

Elly caught onto the mood. "Forgot what?"

"Sloth... Trisha... used to be with the Military..."

"Oh God, Reg... what have we done?" Ok, Elly was beginning to understand why her sweetheart had been so stressed when they visited his folks. "What if they recognize each other?"

"It was a long time ago," Reg gulped. "They might not remember..."

"Might..." Elly echoed.


	5. The Return of Julie D

Trying To Be Human

Chapter 5: The Return of Julie D.

This was later than it should have been. I just had a lot of trouble with this chapter, so I half-assed it. Sorry... but, I'm on summer break now, and I've vowed to finish up all my stories, not to mention, I have most of the rest of this story already written, so updates should be faster from now on. XD

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"Remember, Roy, _best_ behavior," Riza growled, straightening his tie for him.

"I know, I know... Even if they act like complete neanderthals, which I'm sure they will, I'm to set the example for the rest of us,"

It must have been the wrong answer, because Riza tightened the tie into a noose, hissing, "If you mess this up, Colonel, you will never get any nookie ever again. Understand?"

Half suffocating, Roy managed to gasp out, "y-yes, dear."

Riza loosened the tie again. "Good. I'm glad we had this little chat."

-----------------------------------------------------------

Greed, on temporary leave from the hospital, bounced up and down on the bed and watched Sloth help Envy with his tie. "I've got to say, that thing looks ridiculous with the miniskirt. I hope this isn't a very nice restaurant."

"You're going to tear your stitches out," Sloth warned him, wrestling Envy down before he attacked the surgery patient.

"How did you learn how to tie neckties so well, Trisha?" Lust asked, trying to diffuse the tension (they were going by human names all day, just to get used to it).

Sloth went right on tying. "Don't ask questions you don't want to know the answers to."

"Why?" Envy started to ask, "What's so bad about... never mind."

--------------------------------

Reg and Elly sat very still at their reserved table at Le Petite Fleur. Gracia was checking her makeup in the bathroom, and the others hadn't arrived yet.

"They won't remember her," Elly repeated again.

"Nah," Reg replied, his voice unusually high. "She didn't actually work with them, you know... I'm sure they've all forgotten..."

Roy and Riza arrived and were duly seated by an oafish teenage waiter named "Tob". (We are to assume that Gracia also returned somewhere in this interval.)

There was some sundry small talk, with Reg and Elly pale as death, only half paying attention as they watched the doors and clenched each other's hand under the table.

The door opened, and a party of five walked through the door. The tallest one, a man, took off a leather vest with fuzzy white trim, revealing a bright, flamboyant tie. Reg winced.

"Reggie," Elly whispered with a giggle, "Look at Connie."

This time, Reg winced so hard he cramped the muscles in his face. It was bad enough to wear a miniskirt, belly shirt, and spiky hair to a nice restaurant, but a pink tie?

Sloth spotted their table and pushed right past "Tob", waving and calling, "Reg, honey!" Roy caught sight of her.

_They won't remember,_ Reg and Elly thought in unison. _They can't remember,_

"Oh my God!" Roy gasped, rising, "Slothy?"

Riza spun around and stood as well.

"Mustang Salad? Iowa?" Sloth gasped. "You two are _married_? Iowa!" (This seemed directed at Riza) "What ever happened to angry feminist Riza?"

Riza laughed, "You're one to talk. I thought you were all men-are-irresponsible-scum!" She pointed over her shoulder, back at Reg. "Where did this kid come from?"

Sloth laughed as well. "Reggie's adopted. And not all men are scum. Just the ones that I dated." She pulled both of them into a group hug. "God, it's been so long."

"I'll say," Roy said, "When did you get back to planet Earth?"

A brief explanation of this comment:

The mysterious disappearance of King Fuhrer Bradley caused quite a stir. Officially, he had died, but nobody believed that, because 1) no cause of death was ever given, 2) no body was ever found, and 3) they didn't even bother to have a funeral for him. It didn't help that his "death" coincided with the disappearance of his secretary, Juliette Douglas (known as "Slothy" around the office because of her chronic workaholism), and a very large sum of cash.

Popular rumor had it that the pair had split to the Bahamas with their embezzled funds, and now lived in a beach side mansion, sipping tropical rum drinks and laughing at the world.

The other theory was that they were aliens taken back to the mother ship. As for the money... well, Brad had probably left it in his wallet or dropped it or eaten it or something.

Actually, Sloth had been setting up a new life with her friends in the country, but she did occasionally wish that she had run off to the tropics with her old boss.

The new guy, King Fuhrer Dave, was a pretty good guy, but he never showed up to work stoned, and therefore just wasn't the same.

Reg introduced his family, hitting only a slight snag when Roy and Riza remembered Sloth by an entirely different name. She explained it away somehow, Reg didn't quite hear, as his blood pressure went way up from the moment "Julie," left Riza's lips until the waiter asked him what he wanted to eat.

Once he was back in the conversation, however, he found that it went surprisingly well, compared to the night before. There was less Death-Stare from Roy, and that made all the difference.

"So, Slothy, something I've been wondering," Roy asked as they waited for their entrees, "and I figure if anyone knows, you do. What ever happened to the Fuhrer?"

"Oh, him," Sloth shrugged as their waiter returned. "We poisoned him and buried his remains in a shallow grave in our backyard." She flashed them a bright grin and took her plate from the waiter.

After a second of open-mouth gaping, Roy and Riza realized she might be joking, and started to laugh. The Sins smiled, but didn't join in.

"Reg, are you two going to get hitched before you go home?" Lust asked, causing Roy to choke on a crouton from his side salad. He obviously did not want to think about any wedding.

"We were thinking more along the lines of next year," Reg laughed.

Lust frowned, and the others realized she was serious. "Why wait? Better do it as soon as you can, while everything's still looking good."

"I'm sure it'd be best if they waited," Roy said with a twitch. "To give them time to reconsider, I mean, plan things out."

Lust shook her head. "Trust me, shotgun is the way to go. You never know when life is going to throw you a curve ball, and BAM! One of you gets an incurable illness and dies."

Elly went a little white, and Reg felt he should stop this conversation as soon as possible. "Natasha, we are not going to have a shotgun wedding. And don't worry. I doubt either of us will contract an incurable illness."

Lust looked unconvinced, but Gluttony stopped her from arguing, "But, 'Tasha, Reg said I could do the cake... I wouldn't have time,"

Sloth jumped in before anything more could be said. "This is a good time to bring up why we're all here, though."

Gracia and Greed picked up their glasses like they were expecting a toast. Sloth paid them no attention. "We need to talk about how we're going to get this marriage organized."

Greed lowered his glass again, remarking to Gracia, "Should have known, with Trisha, every dinner must have a defined business purpose."

"I'll be honest, we don't know all that much about planning weddings," Riza admitted, to prevent Roy from telling everybody that they were wasting their time, there would be no wedding. "We got married in our dress uniforms on the parade ground by a Military official."

"I'll check, but I think that's one of the signs you've taken your career a little too far," Envy told her with the slightest hint of sarcasm.

"I know," Riza sighed, "not the most romantic thing we could think up, but cheap."

"Well, we don't want our Reg and Elly to have to worry about that," Sloth beamed. (Roy scowled at her use of the word "our".) "You two just leave the money to us."

The implication that the bride's family would be unable to pay for her wedding was too much of a blow to Roy's ego, and, risking Riza's rage, he decided to speak. "We can take care of it."

Sloth only smiled calmly. "Mustang, do you remember all that money that went missing from the treasury awhile back?"

Roy nodded. "Of course. They had all of us off our regular jobs trying to find out where it went... we never did."

Sloth patted his shoulder. "We're paying for the wedding," she assured him.

--------------------------

Reg decided it would be best if he spent the night with his relatives, and Elly went straight to bed when they got home, so Roy, Riza, and Gracia got together to talk about the prospective In-Laws.

"I think they're nice," Gracia revealed to her friends. "It's really great how involved they all want to be. I can't believe Boris is actually making the cake! I didn't even know regular people could make wedding cakes. I thought it was a trade secret."

Riza smiled. "I sure wish you knew how to cook, Roy," she jibed.

"And I sure wish you would dress like Connie," Roy teased.

Gracia laughed. "He certainly was cute, wasn't he?"

"...he?" gulped Roy. The two women giggled.

"You didn't know he was a man?"

"He was wearing a miniskirt!" Roy protested defensively. "And Connie can be a girl's name!"

"Were you hitting on him?" Riza grinned.

Roy very suavely draped an arm over his wife's shoulder. "Riza, baby, you know you're the only one I hit on."

Gracia interrupted, because she knew that it was late, and that they were in danger of forgetting that she was there. "Well, I really like Reggie's family. They all seem like real dolls, especially Greg. He was great,"

"Yeah, I'm glad we met them," Riza agreed. "And who'd of thought Elly would get married to Slothy's boy? It's a small world, I guess."

"We're lucky she's helping out. She seems very organized," Gracia said.

"She is," Riza confirmed. "Unless she's changed drastically since we knew her, you can trust her with things like this. She was always a perfectionist, right, Roy?"

Roy nodded quietly. Something troubling seemed to have occurred to him, and when the telephone rang a second later, and Gracia left to answer it (it turned out to be a wrong number), he managed to tell Riza. "It was Ms. Douglas that,"

Riza stiffened and stared coldly at the wall. "Mustang, we decided a long time ago, that was an unfortunate coincidence. We can't bring all that up again."

Her husband nodded, not making any move to argue. It wasn't a subject he wanted to bring up, either.

--------------------------------

They didn't know it, but in her room, Elly was curled up with her oldest surviving toy, a big teddy bear she had had since she was four, and thinking about the exact same incident.


	6. Back in the Day

Trying To Be Human

Chapter 6: Back in the Day

Warnings: Fluff ahoy!

----------------------------------

On the evening Gracia Hughes was arrested for the murder of her husband, Roy Mustang received a call from her, frantically explaining her situation. After assuring her that he would take care of everything, the colonel called Riza.

"Hawkeye, I need you to come pick me up."

"When are you going to learn to drive?"

"When are you going to stop asking me that?"

"When you stop calling me on _my day off_ to chauffeur your lazy, never-learned-to-drive ass around!"

"But, but, but... I need a ride!" Roy stuttered helplessly.

"Well, too bad."

"But, I've got to get to Hughes' because they arrested Gracia and Elysia's there alone!" he gasped. Silence from the other end. "Hawkeye? Are you still there? Hello?"

Outside his house, a car horn blared loudly, attracting his attention to his front yard, where Riza had parked her car. "Get in the car, Mustang! Time's a-wasting!"

Elysia was a little frightened, but otherwise fine. They found her a big teddy bear to keep her busy and retreated to Maes' former office to use the phone.

"_With all due respect, Colonel, give it up. She shot him. They caught the whole thing on a security camera."_

"Come on, Feury! I'm not asking you to bust her out of jail, I'm just asking for the files he was researching."

"_What good is it going to do?"_ asked the other line tiredly.

"Someone wanted him dead."

"_Um, yeah. His wife! Clean out those pretty ears of yours and listen to me! I watched the video, it is quite clearly Gracia. It couldn't be anyone else. I'm sorry, but it's the truth!"_

"This is insubordination!"

"_Look, Roy, I know you're upset, ok? We all loved Hughes and Gracie, but this is hard enough without you trying to dig up all this useless information!"_

"I'm warning you,"

"_Goodbye, Colonel. I'll talk to you tomorrow."_

Roy stared in hopeless bewilderment at the phone. "The little prick hung up on me."

Riza wasn't paying attention. She was busy reading through some papers she had found lying around. "What's all this stuff on Ms. Douglas? Birthday, hometown, favorite color, grandmother's maiden name... strange, I wouldn't have though of him as the stalker type."

Roy rounded on her. "Hey! Shut yo' mouth!"

"Mustang, he's got her dental records from when she was five. Highlighted with all the places they don't match her current ones."

"Ok," Roy acquiesced, "that is a little weird."

"Yeah," Riza murmured, holding the papers up to the light. "What's even weirder is that they really _don't_ match."

"Maybe... she got braces?" Roy shrugged.

"Maybe. Poor Jule. Braces are awful. One of my friends in high school had to get some, and she never did learn how to kiss."

"On the other hand, you didn't have braces, and you never learned to kiss, either," Roy pointed out.

Riza dropped the file to glare at him angrily. "Says who?"

"When you're as experienced as I am, you can tell," Roy smirked.

"Kissing your superiors' butts doesn't count as experience, you know. And, not that it's any of your business, but I happen to be a first rate kisser."

"Oh, yeah? Well, I am the World's Champion of Making Out!"

The woman rolled her eyes sarcastically. "Prove it," she challenged.

Roy did a double take. "...what?"

"You heard me," Riza growled, taking a step towards him with each word. "Put your mouth where your money is," they where standing face to face now, only inches apart. "Kiss me."

"Fine," Roy said defiantly. "Maybe I will."

-------------------

Ed burst urgently into the house, but halted at once when he found Elysia peacefully asleep on the couch. He tiptoed quietly past her, and then broke into a run, slamming open the door to the office.

Roy and Riza had found, by this time, that it would be best, even necessary, for them to move to a couch, bed, or other such furnishing. However, they had also found that this would take a lot of mood-ruining effort that they didn't feel up to. So, they remained standing in the center of the room, clasped in each others' arms, kissing passionately, and not very worried if their clothes started to unravel or not. Ed didn't seem to notice them any more than they noticed him.

"ENVY!"

Roy cringed. "What is it, Cold-Water-On-The-Groin, I mean, Fullmetal?"

"Envy!" Ed exclaimed again, bounding into the room. "I figured it out, it was Envy! He turned into Gracia and shot him! It all makes sense now!"

Roy and Riza stared at him like he had grown an extra nose.

It took a little time to explain his theory, and even longer to convince the new couple that he wasn't crazy. It didn't help that they were obviously impatient with him being there, and wanted him to hurry and leave so that they could go back to ... being alone.

"So, why would this homnibus—," Roy started.

"Homunculus," corrected Ed.

"Whatever. Why would it kill Hughes?"

This was where Ed's story fell apart. "I don't know... Have you two found out anything here? Besides that you each secretly want the other?"

The pair glared at him. "Well, we did find a pretty extensive file on Juliette," Riza admitted, holding up the thick manilla folder. "I suppose they could be working together."

"Juliette?" Ed asked blankly.

"Douglas?" This didn't ring any of Ed's bells either. "The Fuhrer's secretary? She brings in doughnuts every Monday?" Ed shook his head. "Oh, for God's sake, here's a picture of her. He's got about 50 here."

"Maybe she found out she was being investigated, got pissed, and hired this... homunculus (?) to take care of the problem. What do you think, Edo?"

Maybe it was the shock of Roy actually wanting his opinion, or maybe it was something he ate, but a look astonishingly close to horror was dawning on Ed's face as he stared at the picture Riza had given him. "I... um.. I don't think so... I mean, there's no connection... Milit... homun... Envy's the kind of nut who would shoot a guy on the street, I don't think we need to pull Mo— Miss Douglas into it," he finally gasped, his voice broken with high-pitched nervous giggles. "Say, can I have this file?"

"Sure—,"

Ed was gone before the words left her mouth.

The dental files of Juliette Douglas were never heard of again.

"Hmm... Wonder what that was about," Riza pondered.

"Who cares," winked Roy, "got rid of him, didn't it?"

"True. Now," Riza grinned playfully and pressed her arms against his chest, "where did we leave off?"

"Well," Roy whispered, wrapping his arms around her waist, "I believe we were about to,"

"Roy-san?" asked little Elysia, tiptoeing into the room sleepily. "Is Mommy going to be home soon? I'm hungry."

Roy and Riza sprang apart quickly, Riza kneeling next to the girl."I'm afraid she won't be home for a few days, sweetie. But don't worry. Roy'll stay here and watch out for you."

"Where's Mommy? Did she go to visit Daddy? Is he coming home with her?"

Roy and Riza went pale. Riza's smile sputtered. Roy gulped.

"Hawkeye... maybe you should go and... you know..."

"Talk to the police..." she finished, heading shakily to the door.

"Remember, homunculus."

"Right." she nodded, but hesitated before leaving. "Mustang, what is a homunculus, anyway?"

"...uh... I think it's just Ed's term for generic enemies... but, it doesn't really matter. Our goal at this point is to get Gracia free."

"Right," Riza nodded once again, this time leaving without any qualms.

--------------------

Elysia looked vaguely troubled as Roy banged around the kitchen preparing dinner.

"Roy-san, if Mommy doesn't come home, what are we going to eat?"

Roy laughed and held up a pot. "I'm cooking dinner."

The little girl's eyes widened. "You can cook?"

"Of course I can cook!" the man exclaimed proudly. "After all, I survived on my own through most of my adult life."

Elysia frowned. "Daddy said you lived off canned soup and frozen waffles."

Roy glared irately at the picture of his best friend over on a nearby wall. "Your father wasn't there, so he didn't know... Why don't you get the maple syrup out for me?"

-----------------------------

Grown-up Elysia sighed. Roy and Riza still lived pretty much off canned soup and frozen waffles, which she knew her father would have found hysterically funny.

Her family always found the story of her mother's arrest, and Roy and Riza's subsequent attempts to navigating the justice system while babysitting her, very amusing. When telling them, they would gloss over the more painful aspects (Maes's death, the fruitless search for the mysterious Envy, and a few very sordid court episodes) and focus on the good bits, but tonight, Elly wasn't interested in the good bits.

She had thought that it would be easy to keep Reg's secret. It wasn't that she felt guilty for marrying the former Wrath. She loved him, she loved his whole family, she understood that they were no longer what they used to be, and she knew her family wouldn't see it that way. She just didn't like lying to them, no matter what the reason. Reg was leaving to stay for a few days with his family in the country the next morning, so that she could spend some time alone with her folks. She had thought it was a good idea. Now she wasn't so sure.


	7. Fur Elysia

Trying to be Human

Chapter 7: Für Elysia

I like Elly's full name.

------------------------

"You look awful," Roy remarked, pouring Elly a cup of coffee as she stumbled into the kitchen. She didn't ask why he was in their kitchen in the first place. She figured he had just wanted a square meal.

"I didn't get much sleep last night."

"Worried about something?"

Elly managed a tired smile. "Oh, nothing important." And that was the truth. Sitting in the bright, familiar of her childhood, with a man she had known and adored for as long as she could remember, she realized how trivial all her worries were. So what if her fiancee's family had been responsible for her father's death? In the long run, what did it really matter?

Roy stirred more sugar into his coffee to distract himself from watching his surrogate daughter play with her engagement ring. "How much do you really know about this Reg?"

The young woman smiled infatuatedly. "Besides that I'm madly in love with him?"

"This is serious, Elysia. He acts like he's hiding something."

The smile disappeared. In fact, her expression became downright grim. It had occurred to Elly that, through some unhappy miracle, Roy had found out about her beloved's lamentable past. "What makes you say that?"

"Nothing, really, just a hunch."

"I know that you worry about me, Roy-san," she said seriously, staring straight into the man's eyes as she spoke, "but I assure you, I know the worst of my Reggie's secrets, and there is nothing he can hide from me I would not forgive."

"I just don't like him. And I don't think your father would approve of him."

There was nothing Roy could have said to strike a nerve with Elly the way that simple statement did. She slammed down her coffee, spattering Roy with a little shower of caffeinated liquid, pushed her chair over standing up. "How would you know?" she screamed, running for the door. "You aren't my real father!"

----------------------

When Gracia made her way into the kitchen a few hours later, she was surprised to find Roy sitting at the table covered in a thin coating of coffee, but she figured he had wanted a square meal. "Sorry I slept in so late," she apologized, pouring herself a mug of the coffee. "I think I may have drank a little bit too much wine last night."

"Well, you don't get out much, you should be allowed to enjoy yourself," Roy laughed, finally coming to and beginning a search for the paper towels.

"Some of us had daughters to set examples for when the rest of us were out partying," Gracia reminded him. "Speaking of daughters, did you catch Elly this morning? Do you have any idea where she might be?"

"I don't know. She was a little upset when I saw her last," admitted Roy, preparing to explain the entire morning's events.

-----------------some time later-----------

Gracia stared at him. "You... told her that her dead father wouldn't like her fiancee?" she asked slowly, wanting to get the details right. Roy nodded. "You said that. To my daughter." Once again, Roy nodded, and Gracia slapped him so hard that he dropped his coffee. "Get the hell out of my house."

Still a little shell-shocked, Roy turned to leave, but Elly's mother changed her mind. "No, on second thought, you stay right where you are. I'm calling Riza."

For the first time that morning, Roy went pale.

---------------------------------

For some bizarre, unknown reason, Maes Hughes' grave had become a common meeting place for Central couples, so Elly had to deal with a few people trying to hook up, but they recognized her quickly and cleared out apologetically. (How they recognized her was a mystery to Elly, she had certainly never seen them before, and they were too young to be old friends of her father's. Oddly enough, Gracia and Elly had never had a problem being alone in the cemetery, even though Roy was constantly complaining about the crowd.)

Finally alone, the girl threw herself, sobbing, before her father's tomb, which she was still doing when she was found. "Daddy, I'm so sorry," she whimpered. "I don't know what to do,"

"Elysia Chan Hughes!" Gracia snapped, spinning her daughter around to face her. "You listen to me! Your father is _dead_. He's passed on. He is no more. He has ceased to be. He's expired and gone to meet his maker. He's a stiff, bereft of life, he rests in peace. He's pushing up the daisies, his metabolic processes are now history. He's off his twig, he's kicked the bucket, he's shifted off his mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the choir invisible. You are apologizing to a tombstone! A slab of granite with a name etched on it by Big Bill's Memorials. It can't hear you any more than Paula Shultz over here," she waved at the adjacent grave, kneeling down next to Elly. "I loved your father, Elysia, and you know that, but what he wanted for you really doesn't matter anymore. Just because someone is dead, doesn't mean you have to be responsible to them."

In response, Elly threw her arms around her mother's neck, and the two of them sat there for a long while, just the two Hughes women (and a young couple who passed through on a date and removed themselves discreetly when they saw the two mourners were having a moment. They would later tell their friends, and would become famous in their circle the way that friends who have seen celebrities do.)

"Mommy?" Elly asked quietly. "What if... what if I told you that Roy-san's right... Daddy really wouldn't like Reggie?"

Her mother laughed and ruffled her hair. "First off, I doubt very much that that's true. Your father liked pretty much everybody. And second, I already told you, don't worry so much about it."

"I mean, he really wouldn't like him."

"I don't doubt that he would hate any boy you tried to marry. Now, why don't we head back to the house. I think that Roy may have a very heartfelt, not at all force apology to give."

Her daughter grinned and stood up, but Gracia remained for a second, glancing around to make sure Elly wasn't watching, and giving her husband's headstone a quick kiss before leaving.

------------------------------------

Elly was set up comfortably on the couch in the living room to await Roy's apology, when Riza walked through, which was good, because Elly still wasn't sure. "Riza?"

"Hmm?"

"What do you think of Reg?"

The older woman pulled up a chair to face Elly. "I really don't know him. You can't get the measure of a boy who's trying to impress his in-laws."

This was not the helpful advice that Elly had been hoping for. "You don't have any opinion of him at all?"

Riza thought about this. "Does he treat you right?"

"Like a princess," Elly smiled.

"And do you enjoy spending time with him?"

"Always."

"And do you trust him?"

"With my life."

Riza smiled. "Then what does my opinion matter? It sounds like you two are right for each other. Don't worry about us. Your mother loves him, I don't care as long as you're happy, and I'm sure that he'll grow on the colonel." Elly smiled back, and Riza, satisfied that the young woman had finally received the helpful advice she wanted, stood up, just as Roy shuffled in, taking her chair.

"Elysia," he began, after Riza had left. "Your mother and my wife have informed me that you are in love. I may have been slow to recognize it, having never experienced it myself except pertaining to Black Hayate, but, after extensive education, I realize now that this young man... er, Reg, is, while nowhere near good enough for my Elysia, not a bad person, and that it would make you very happy to be with him. And, even though it may not always seem like it, I do want to see you happy. So, I wish to offer you and Reg my apologies, and let you know that someday, perhaps someday not very far from now, I will get over the initial prejudices I have against Reg for stealing my little girl, and, in the meantime, you two are not to listen to a word I say, and remember that I am only being rude because I care about you."

"I know you do, Roy-san," Elly assured him, taking his hand from across the coffee table. "And, I was wondering... you're as close as a father to me, will you give me away at the wedding?"

Roy balked. This was not something he had planned on dealing with. Just the words "give away" were distasteful to him. But Elly was staring at him with those cute Bambi eyes that she had mastered when she was a little girl, not to mention Riza and Gracia were waiting in the kitchen with an array of sharp knives, and he knew that he was going to end up agreeing to do this, the most difficult mission in his entire career.


	8. Cold Feet

Trying To Be Human

Chapter 8: Cold Feet

A/N: I could have sworn that I mentioned that they buried Pride in the backyard in If You Give A Sin A Soul, but I was reading through it again, and I guess I didn't... oops...

--------------------

"You want how much? For these steaks!.? I would be ashamed to feed these steaks to my dog! When I was growing up, you could have fed a wedding party three times this size a full-course meal for less than you are charging for these steaks!" Sloth admonished the butcher, waving a wrapped package of beef around for emphasis. With two days left until the wedding, the Sins' house, the chosen location, had been transformed into something like a war zone, and there was no doubt in anybody's mind that Sloth was the commander. Her gift for haggling, an instinct she had been created with, had long been admired, and it was thriving under the stress of arranging this wedding. "I could have hired a caterer with the money you're charging!"

"Trisha, you said I could," Gluttony, standing near her at the front door to testify to the quality of the meat order, butted in timidly.

"Of course, but it's the principle of the thing," she assured the chef, returning the butcher, "Do you know children are starving in Ishbal? And you have the audacity to charge this much for steaks?"

Envy walked down the stairs in the background, tripping over the fold-up alter and plunging, head first, into the spools of gauzy netting that were to eventually form an awning in the backyard, where the ceremony would take place. (Sloth had not paid full price for either of these things.) "God dammit!" he shrieked, flailing about and getting more and more tangled, until he had more fabric wrapped around him that the spools. "Someone help me!"

Lust stepped over a series of collapsing chairs, pulling out her metal fingernail. "Don't panic, Connie, I'm coming,"

WHAP! A package of steak hit the would-be-rescuer upside the head.

"Don't you dare cut that, there isn't enough as is!" shrieked Sloth. "Stop fooling around! Connie, you should be picking the Mustangs up at the station already! And Natasha, I thought I asked you to clean up the guest rooms!"

Reg inched through the livingroom, hiding behind the matrimony-related clutter. He had been staying with his family for the past couple of weeks, not to mention dealing with them constantly all year while arranging his wedding, and he knew enough to stay out of sight. Aside from the danger of being put to work by Sloth, Lust, or Gluttony, Envy had found that the best way to relieve stress was still take all his aggression out on Reg in the form of kicking and insults. Not to mention, Roy would be coming soon, if Envy ever got untangled, and, despite his promises to Elly, Mr. Mustang had not gotten any better about being nice.

--------------------

Reg wandered through the huge backyard, admiring the scenery and staying away from the windows. It was a gorgeous yard, beautifully landscaped, and even though it meant more interaction with his folks, he agreed whole-heartedly with Elly's decision to get married there. The landscaping was spectacular, all the plants lovingly cared for, just a little something else that could be attributed to Sloth's hobbies. The roses in the flower garden where in full bloom, mixing with the honeysuckle that climbed up the side of the house and giving the air a wonderfully sweet fragrance. Somebody could make a fortune with a perfume like that, Reg reflected, tiptoeing through the large vegetable garden towards the tiny shade garden that marked the end of the property.

A weeping willow and an assortment of rhododendron bushes cut the little area off from view and kept it in semi-darkness no matter what time of day. It was a peaceful little area, but (or possibly because) Reg didn't spend much time there. However, now it occurred to him that it would make an excellent hiding spot. He pushed through the foliage.

"So, yeah, we've all got our tuxes and stuff... Reggie's pretty nervous, but I think that's because Mustang's still giving him a hard time," Reg halted to better eavesdrop on Greed's conversation with himself. "He'll get over it. We've picked on him enough to toughen him up."

"Talking to yourself, Greg?" Reg asked, breaking his silence and entering the clearing where Greed was sitting, his back against a convenient tree stump.

"Oh, no, no, I was talking to Pride," Greed explained, pointing to the headstone. (Actually, it was a stepping stone they had ordered from a gardening catalog for pet graves, but they figured no one would notice the difference.) "I like to come out here once in a while to let him know how everyone's doing. And to work on my tan."

Reg dismissed this as a very typical Greed Statement. He sat down on the grass next to his (living) relative. "You two were good friends?"

"For lack of a better word," Greed shrugged. "I was just telling him how big you've gotten... At least one of the family babies grew up all right."

"Family babies?"

"You and 'Tasha and Trish, of course. You three were so little and innocent,"

Reg snorted. He loved Lust and Sloth, but "little and innocent" was a bit of a stretch.

Greed ruffled the young man's hair. "Much as I hate to admit when Connie's right, he did always say that you would be the one to break the cycle and become a functional person."

"Connie used to say that?" laughed Reg heartily. Good old Greed with his stand-up comedian humor. "Was this before or after the little green men from outer space raided Central looking for Starbucks coffee?"

"You don't believe me? Can't you think of anything Connie's ever done for you?"

"Besides deride and humiliate me? ... no, nothing comes to mind."

"He helped you get into college."

"That was Trisha."

"Oh... didn't he tell you how to ask girls out?"

"That was Natasha."

"Right... um... He was the one who helped you with the Stone,"

"That was YOU, Greg, and that was for all of us,"

Greed furrowed his brow, trying to think of something Envy had done for this kid. He knew there had to be something... Envy, like all the older Sins, had cared very much for the three youngest ones' welfare. Something, sometime... "What about FullMetal?"

"What about him? I don't think he did all that much for me, either," Reg replied sassily. But, the name, unmentioned in the Sin household for years, jogged his memory, just a little... leading to... A FLASHBACK!

_He couldn't remember exactly why he and Ed had been fighting, or exactly where they were fighting. He only remembered how it ended._

_He had tripped, and the next thing he knew, Ed had him pinned to the ground. He couldn't move, try as he like to escape. He looked around desperately for something, anything, but all he could see was Ed... and Ed's metal arm, which was in sword mode, and had never looked more frightening._

"_Now, it's time for me to take back what you've stolen from me," the gold-eyed alchemist hissed. And all of a sudden, Wrath understood. Ed was going to chop off his arm... and that scared him (Wrath...not Ed)... and being scared made him angry._

_Terrified, and with no other options, Wrath began screaming every obscenity he knew, and he knew quite a few. This wasn't going to stop Ed, but it couldn't hurt to try..._

"_Language, Wrath!" admonished a mysterious, silky voice. Ed's head snapped towards it, and Wrath stopped screaming and struggled to get a look at the speaker, who was still talking. "And, shame on you, Edward. Beating up on a little kid?"_

"_Oh, please," Ed snarled, still trying to hold Wrath in place. "It's not a child. It's not even human."_

"_Um... Brother?" Al started talking, and Wrath struggled even harder to see what the heck was going on. "Could you try being nicer so he doesn't shoot me?"_

"_In any case," the voice continued, cutting off Ed's response. "I believe that, and correct me if I'm wrong, the arm you are about to so humanely cut off was the price paid so you could keep your darling brother alive, was it not?" Ed nodded cautiously, and the voice persisted with a dangerous edge to it, "So, by trying to take the arm back, you're telling me that you don't want your little brother anymore, right?" Without waiting for an answer, the voice kept on, "So, you don't object to me putting a bullet through Al's seal, _right_?"_

"_No! NO! Oh, God, DON'T HURT HIM!" Ed started panicking, but he still didn't let Wrath up to see what was going on, which was beginning to annoy the boy slightly._

"_Let Wrath up," the voice demanded smoothly, and Wrath was free and running towards Sloth (it had to be Sloth, who else would it...)_

"_Envy?" Wrath squeaked, too surprised to stop himself from jumping towards his rescuer like he had planned to._

_Envy tossed aside the gun he had been threatening Al with (rather luckily it didn't go off), and caught the boy with a smile. Carrying Wrath, he turned to go, but not without casually remarking to Ed, "If you're sick of dealing with Al, there's no need to involve Wrath, but you cannot lay a hand on Wrath without us 'involving' Al. Remember that next time you need a small child to pick on." Then, he quietly asked Wrath, "Are you alright? He didn't hurt you, did he?"_

_Burning bright red, Wrath shook his head and tried to bury his face in Envy's shoulder so he couldn't tell the boy had been crying._

_Envy must have noticed, but he didn't mention it. Instead he sighed a little to himself and changed the subject. "Why don't we go get some ice-cream, ok?"_

And, now that Reg thought about it, Ed had never bothered him since that incident.

Greed was staring at him, a grin on his lips. Just like he thought, there was something.

Feeling inexplicably lighter, happier, and less nervous, Reg returned to the house, where Sloth was writing the butcher a check for considerably less than he had originally asked. Lust had left to pick up the Mustangs, and Envy was still thrashing around in the decorations. Reg ran to help him.

"I can do it myself!" the humanoid shape under the gauze snapped irately. Reg laughed and kept helping.

------------------------------

"See! No problem!" Envy snarled once free, three-quarters of an hour later. "You were just in the way."

Reg smiled as he wound up the fabric once again. "Hey, Envy, since I'm catching you in a good mood and everything, I was wondering if sometime... you know, when this whole mess is over and everything has calmed down... if you wanted to go get a couple of drinks with me and bitch about what horrible scum our creators were."

Completely caught off guard, Envy stared at him. He hadn't heard Reg use the word "creator" in well over a decade. Ever since they got their souls, in fact, even before that, Wrath had preferred to act as though they were normal everyday humans. The boy had certainly never volunteered to spend time alone with him. And now, out of the blue, he was offering to do something that, deep down, Envy had always wished they could. "You mean that?"

"Yeah. I do," Reg nodded. "It's about time that I stop trying so hard to be human."


	9. The Elysia Hughes Wrath Wedding

Trying To Be Human

Chapter 9: The Elysia Hughes-Wrath Wedding

A/N: Well, here it is. The long-awaited ending (except the epilogue, which is coming very soon). It's taken about a year to write, and during that year, this story has started to suck the life out of me. I still love it to death, but, let's face it, it's nowhere near as good as If You Give A Sin A Soul. I suppose this is what I get for trying to defy the law of the universe that clearly states that sequels must suck.

-----------------------------

The one huge plus to having their quiet home completely invaded by Elly's family, Elly's friends, Reg's friends, and assorted wedding guests was that the overrun little village where the Sins resided could no longer complain about those "isolated, creepy folks out on the outskirts who never interact with anyone", because it was blatantly clear that they did interact with people... just not local people.

The only problem with this was that the Sins had gotten the reputation as "isolated, creepy folks out on the outskirts who never interact anyone" because they didn't _like_ to interact with people. They enjoyed their solitude, and the hubbub of human beings around them was a rude reminder as to why they enjoyed it in the first place.

Their rooms infested with guests and people organizing the reception and decorations, Greed, Envy, and Reg were taking refuge in the one sane room in the house: the kitchen. Wedding foods, as everyone knows, are the most difficult foods on earth to prepare, why else would they cost so much, so casual passers-by were avoiding the kitchen as though it had the plague (which is an awful thing for a kitchen to have). This left the room empty except for Gluttony, who was smiling brightly and forcing his guests to beat eggs and pipe meringues in exchange for shelter.

"Boris! Why aren't those hors d'oeuvres ready yet?" Sloth scolded, barging without the slightest regard for any souffles that may be in danger of falling. Gluttony pointed wordlessly to a platter of finger foods that Reg was carefully drizzling sauce over top of to earn his keep. He had thought he was doing a good job of it, but Sloth disagreed.

"Reg! What are you doing here?" she shrieked, her once-perfectly-brushed hair standing on end. You'd have thought he was setting fire to the table or something. "Your friends are upstairs looking for you! You were supposed to be in your tux an hour ago!"

"Greg and Connie aren't in their tuxes!"

"They aren't the groom!" Sloth started to yell before doing a double-take. "Wait, Greg and Connie?" she turned to the two men she had overlooked on her first glance through the room. "Why aren't _you_ two dressed?"

"You're not dressed either," shrugged Greed.

Sloth jerked her head down to look at her lilac business suit, as though frightened it had suddenly disappeared. "Yes I am."

"You're wearing _that_?" Envy asked, not bothering to keep the disdain out of his voice.

"It's sensible," Sloth informed him.

"It's like 20 years old or something. I'm surprised it's not one big moth hole by now."

Sloth responded with a threatening glare that clearly communicated the point; "Tuxes. Now."

--------------------------------------------

Sitting alone in her room (the privacy was the first she'd had for two days, and likely to be the last for a while, too), Lust slipped into an elegant floor-length dress, the white counterpart to the black she'd worn for years, complete with long white gloves and high-heeled white boots. Her long, silky hair she left down, as always. No earrings, no bracelets, no jewelry, no ornaments. She didn't need them, Lust thought, admiring herself in the mirror. Outside her door, she could hear people who needed to use her room. Well, she was ready to go.

Except...

Lust looked out the window at the decorations being set up outside. This was a special occasion. Wrath was getting married, a milestone that marked more than just an event in the life of a family member. Without being able to explain it, even without mentioning it among themselves, they all knew that this was some kind of turning point in all of their lives. One of those monumental events, Lust decided, that warranted her most precious possession.

"Hey! Is anybody in there?" someone shouted, knocking on the door, hoping to find a room to change in.

"I'll be out in a second!" Lust shouted right back, sitting back down at the vanity and removing an old box from one of the drawers. She lifted the lid, raising the necklace out reverently. The pretty blue and gold locket on a simple chain held nothing, none of the pictures or objects of remembrance associated with lockets. The pendant itself was all she needed to remind her, and she wore it only on those precious days that would become part of who she was. Lust kissed the necklace, her lips brushing the cold surface,

KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK!

"JUST A SECOND!" Lust snapped, fastening the catch around her neck and taking a final look in the mirror. Perfect.

-------------------------------------------------

Roy and Riza, already changed into their formal outfits, were wandering around those parts of the backyard not taken over by chairs and decorations. They, of course, were arguing.

"Couldn't you have worn a skirt or something?" Roy was saying.

"It's a _dress_ uniform. It counts!"

"You didn't let me wear _my_ uniform."

"You're part of the ceremony, you have to look nice," Riza explained snappishly. "Anyway, you look cute in a suit."

"I look like Colonel Sanders or something," Roy complained, adjusting his tie and tripping over a stone marker. "What the hell?"

"Looks like they've got a shallow unmarked grave back here," Riza laughed, replacing the stepping stone. This sunk in, and she and Roy gulped.

"It must be about time to start... we should really go back..."

------------------------------------------

"WE NEED TO BORROW SOMETHING!" yelled a young woman in a bridesmaids dress, slamming into Lust in a panic.

"What?" Lust asked.

"ANYTHING! Something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue! The pearls are old, the dress is new, there are blue flowers in the bouquet, we need something borrowed!"

Always ready in a crisis, albeit an unusual one, Lust surveyed her outfit, looking for something detachable. No earrings, no bracelets, no jewelry, no ornaments, nothing except for her locket. With a slight hesitation, Lust unclasped the chain and handed it carefully to the concerned girl. "Here. Be careful with this. I'll need it back."

"ELLY!" the bridesmaid yelled, relieved. "Problem solved!"

Elly stuck her head out the bathroom door, and her friend held up the necklace. "Oh... Natasha, it's beautiful."

The reverent expression that had dominated Lust's face when she parted with her precious locket had disappeared. She squinted at the pendant, trying to understand why she had been so attached to it. It was, after all, just a necklace. "I suppose." She stared harder at the jewelry. "It really isn't something I would have chosen," she remarked, more to herself than to the girls.

---------------------------------------

"And here's the man of the hour, Reg. Smart money's on him bolting," Greed narrated for the wedding home video he was filming, zooming in on the sweaty-palmed young man fidgeting at the alter, looking, with all due respect to Greed, like he was about ready to bolt. "Poor Elly. She's trading down,"

"Greg," Sloth hissed, sitting in the front row between him and Gracia in her capacity as Surrogate Mother of the Groom. "Someday he's going to see that."

Greed swung the camera around to get a shot of her. "Changing the subject, here are the two lovely mothers, Trish and Gracia, smile, ladies! Uh-oh, music's changing... Reg, if you're gonna run for it, you'd better hurry, the bride's coming... with her hostile escort who won't hesitate to hunt you down if you hurt his baby girl,"

Through some miracle of self control, Roy was looking serious, even grim, but not threatening (on the video, Greed commented that drugs may have been involved). It was actually possible to think of him as a normal father-of-the-bride rather than a potential psycho killer.

"Is that 'Tasha's necklace on Elly's wrist?" Greed whispered to Sloth as the bride walked past. "I think it is! She never lets anyone touch that,"

Sloth, watching the action blithely, waved at him to shut up without turning her head.

Elly reached the alter, beaming happily, and tried to step forward... but Roy's arm locked down on hers, almost like a reflex. She pecked him on the cheek and tried again, but he really had a death grip on her. The spectators, Elly included, giggled and tittered, but he didn't release her.

"Mustang," growled a voice from the bride's side. Roy finally managed to let Elly go, although he stayed glued to the spot until Gracia stood up and tugged him into the seat next to her.

The procession was over, and it was time for the main event, the ceremony.

It was towards the middle of this homestretch that Lust patted Envy's hand and discreetly slipped him a handkerchief. "Don't worry. I'll never tell Reggie that you cried at his wedding."

"I'm not crying," Envy whispered back defiantly, his voice somewhat hoarse. "I'm just allergic to these stupid flowers."

"I already promised not to tell."

"Do you remember when we first found him, Lust? He was so _tiny_ and... and... just look at him. He looks so happy and mature and..." Envy choked into Lust's handkerchief. "I don't know what's wrong with me."

Lust chuckled kindly and squeezed her friend's hand again. "Our little Wrath is grown up. That's what's wrong. Sloth's probably bawling her eyes out right now."

Sloth, it may be noted, was not bawling her eyes out. Apparently calmed back down to her normal self by having all the planning over and done, she was smiling serenely throughout the ceremony, and continued to throughout the reception, which Envy noticed.

"Am I the only one who lost it back there?" he whispered to Lust between munches on an hors d'oeuvre.

"Probably. Like I said, I won't tell," she reassured him. "Uh-oh, Gree- Greg's hitting on Gracia..."

Envy shook his head. "I thought he'd outgrown stuff like that... I'll go talk some sense into him."

Roy had decided that the best way to deal with this wedding was to get a little drunk, and, surprisingly, this really did help a good deal. In this slightly more lax state of mind, watching Elly and Reg doing the chicken dance with various other young folks gave him a bizarre, unfamiliar, warm, fuzzy feeling. The kind of feeling that told him to sneak up on his wife and wrap his arms around her. "Rizy, did I ever tell you how happy I am that you married me?"

His captive rolled her eyes. "No, Roy, how happy are you?"

"I'm so happy that... that... I'd give up all the frozen waffles in the world for you."

"I should get you drunk more often," Riza grinned. "I'd forgotten you could be so romantic."

As for the happy couple of the hour, they, of course, seemed to have been surgically attached at the lips... except for the traditional slow dances with every one of their in-laws, family members, friends, members of the band, ect., as well as holding still while every one of the guests took group pictures of everyone in the party in increasingly more ridiculous poses ("ok, now let's get Elly, Gracia, and Riza in a Charlie's Angels pose...").

But even that ordeal ended, and they were eventually allowed to get into the limo and drive off. The other guests weren't so lucky.

The Sins, you see, had no use whatsoever for leftover little meringue shells filled with fruit salad, bite-sized asparagus tarts, or broiled scallops on decorative toothpicks, and nobody was allowed to leave until all of these things were gone.

It was quite late when the last lingering, well-fed guests toddled off to their hotels and train stations, and most of the Sins wanted to collapse and sleep for several days. However, after a year of taking orders from Sloth, they felt lost unless she gave them permission to do this, and she was missing, so they began a search of the house to find her.

Gluttony, who wasn't actually part of the search, but happened to be going into the dinning room, found her huddled in a corner, sobbing, surrounded by shards of glass from a platter that she had been carrying when she was hit with the mood. This struck him as odd, so he alerted the others.

"Slothy! Sloth, are you ok?" Envy and Greed gasped, seeing the glass. Lust, for all practical purposes, ignored them to make sure that Gluttony was ok and not too freak out.

"My baby is gone," sobbed the lump in the corner. "I lost my baby. He's not my little boy anymore."

"Shh, it's ok," soothed the others.

"I was so happy because he's all grown up and in love and happy, but he's still gone. Why do children have to grow up?"

"I don't know, sweetie," Envy murmured, hoisting her up out of the glass. "Come on, let's get you some tea. I hear it helps empty-nest."

------------------------------------------

Far far away, Reg and Elly had arrived at their hotel and were happily examining the various high-class extras that came with the suit.

"Ooh, Reggie, look! There's a mini-fridge!"

"Neat," Reg agreed, loosening his tie and throwing his jacket on the bed. After a moment of thought, he turned around and flopped onto the bed face-up himself. "It's over. It's finally over."

Unseen by her recently-acquired husband, Elly stopped examining the coffee maker and grinned mischievously. She jumped onto the bed, half next to, half on top of the startled Reg. "Wait just a minute. It's not over yet," she reminded him sternly. "We are still married."

"Oh, yeah," Reg grinned, kissing his bride. "I'd forgotten about that."

---------------------------------

(A/N: It's not over yet! The Epilogue is coming in a few hours! Don't give up on me, people! Maybe send in a couple of reviews while you're waiting?)


	10. Epilogue

Trying To Be Human

Chapter 10: The Epilogue

----------------an undetermined amount of years after the wedding------------------

The printer on Greed's high-speed Internet computer whirred into action, spitting out yet another batch of digital photos.

Greed, forced away from his precious computer, watched helplessly from the sidelines. "You'd better pay for a new ink cartridge, Connie, you hear me?"

"But... but, Greg!" Envy protested. (They had no real occasion to use their human names at the moment, but more and more they had been popping up just in casual conversation.) "I have to at least print this one out! Look at how cute she is! I _have_ to show everybody. Just look," Envy shoved a barely-dried print an inch in front of Greed's nose. "Look! Say she's the cutest child ever! SAY IT!"

Greed rolled his eyes, grinning in the face of the semi-sane Envy. "Yes, En, she's sweet."

Pacified by this confirmation, Envy smiled adoringly at the photo, continuing to talk to Greed, who he was convinced was equally interested in the subject. How could he not be? "Isn't she? You won't believe what Reggie says she did the other day, she was,"

Greed shifted uncomfortably. Once Envy got going, it was hard to stop him. "Why don't you go show Trish your photos?"

Envy brightened and dashed off, grabbing a handful of papers out of the printer. Greed took a deep breath. Ever since Cara Mae had been born, Envy had been obsessed with his baby granddaughter, constantly pestering Reg and Elly for pictures, visiting them whenever possible, and telling anyone who would listen everything about her. They couldn't even take him to the grocery store anymore, as he would corner the other shoppers and show off his photo gallery, which he kept with him at all times. It was hauntingly familiar... and yet... they couldn't quite put their finger on why.

_Once again, the credits start rolling, except this time around, the sound FX people got plenty of extra soundtrack music to match up and entertain the reader. (Note: soundtrack not included. Reader must supply own. KalliopeStarmist recommends _Abbey Road _by The Beatles.)_

_The "Arise Chicken" chant is plagiarized from the only episode of AquaTeen Hunger Force that the author has ever seen._

_Domino's Pizza, The Simpsons, WeightWatchers, The Iowa Hawkeyes, and The Royai Fans of the World deny any knowledge of KalliopeStarmist's actions. Read fic at own risk._

_The authoress wishes to thank (read: stole ideas from) the following:_

_Boris Karloff_

_Some Naruto AMV based on a Nutrigrain commercial_

_Bruce Cameroon_

_The Brave Men and Bots of The Satellite of Love_

_Steve Martin _

_My good friend, Dear Ray Americana_

_Dave Barry_

_Bill Watterson_

_Monty Python and their Flying Circus _

_and, last, but by no stretch of the imagination least; _

_The Creators of the FullMetal Alchemist anime, without which, there would be no Wrath._

_Also, special thanks to:_

_The Nuances of Toast, as always_

_The Seven Deadly Sins Guild on GaiaOnline_

_The Frank Archer in a Dress: An FMA Chat Guild on GaiaOnline_

_The Wonderful People I met at Ohayocon '06 (You know who you are.)_

_Smoe. Somebody had to keep reviewing the monstrosity. That person was Smoe. Smoe will recieve, as a token of my gratitude, a slightly stale giant cookie of a flavor of his choice._

_Contemplative, who did her even best to keep reviewing and deserves some kind of trophy._

_Everybody who reviewed/faved/alerted this story (or me!)_

_Everybody who demanded a sequel (even if they didn't get around to reading it.)_

_The two people (Contemplative and bOB) who reviewed Lust of Ishbala._

_My mom and dad. They try so hard to figure out what I'm up to._

_Umm... er... The Amestris Military. Nice uniforms._

_Well, that's about it. Remember to check out my profile after the feature. I've got quite a few other FMA stories up. You never know, you might find something you like!_

_Also, I have a very nice policy wherein I reply personally to every review I get, just an added incentive to tell me how much you love my stuff! (Self insertion and egomania never hurt anyone.)_

The background music fades out once again, and the lights go up on a fancy teacup balanced on top of a nice laser printer, which is just finishing printing out "Thanks for reading, you've been a tremendously patient audience. Give yourselves a hand."

Elly's Armstrong Sparkle and Reg's Envy Sparkle fly into the picture together, confer in their little sparkly voices, and jump on the "print button" again.

"A Flying Kick of DOOM 2 Production," comes out this time. The two sparkles read it, nod in a satisfied way, and sit down together on the edge of the teacup.

THE END (for real this time!)

"For God's sake, Mustang, just burst into tears and let Hawkeye comfort you already." - Bradley at Hughes' funeral.


End file.
